CREEDE HINSHAW: The scriptures are sufficient; no need for mumbo-jumbo

Have you ever opened the Bible to a random page and, seeking guidance from God, put your index finger down on a verse, hoping that that specific verse, by some divine power, would give you wisdom, guidance or assurance?

Depending on your faith background, such a practice is either sheer superstition to be avoided at all costs or a pure practice of faith that sidesteps the human propensity to get things wrong.

The church has debated the efficacy of such a practice for probably close to 2,000 years; those who support the practice defend it ardently while debunkers contend that God gave us the scriptures to read, study and understand without need for mumbo-jumbo.

This ancient practice isn’t restricted to Christianity. Long before the birth of Jesus, people were using Homer and Virgil in the same way. The appearance of the printed Bible simply made it easier to practice what had long been employed. In fact, this practice in its variation even has a few Latin names. The one describing the finger-pointing method is called sortes biblicae. In English it is called sortilege.

One way we know sortilege was practiced from the earliest days of the church is because some church councils banned the practice, threatening to expel anybody who practiced this form of divination. The fact that sortes biblicae was repeatedly banned indicates that it takes more than a church document to stop people from doing what they are going to do.

I have long known that John Wesley, the Church of England priest who reluctantly founded Methodism, was a practitioner of sortilege. He picked up this practice from Count Zinzendorf and the Moravians when he came to the Colony of Georgia in the early 1730s as chaplain to the settlers in Savannah and Frederica. Tortured by whether he should marry Sophy Hopkey or hold fast to his vow to remain single, he practiced this method more than once.

It didn’t seem too effective, however, because he bungled the romance in major ways. Back in England and struggling in 1739 as whether to abandon the church pulpit and preach in the open air, he again used sortilege. Unhappy with the first result he tried a second time. The next verse seeming no more helpful than the first, he finally took a deep breath, resolved to be “more vile,” and made the plunge.

Some have justified the practice by citing examples in the Old and New Testament where people cast lots to make decisions, including when the disciples chose a disciple to replace the deceased Judas Iscariot. One can also cite adherents of this practice from practically the start of Christianity. John Wesley was willing to push the boundaries, as was his brother Charles. Countless other well-known followers of Jesus have done so.

I suppose the practice of sortilege may have the advantage of removing human deviousness and error from the decision-making process, but from my standpoint, the practice isn’t far removed from finding guidance by opening a fortune cookie. I don’t recommend it.